Chapter 933: The Bifurcated Longchuan

In reality, this jade pendant was right in his hand. Now he knew it was a gift from Zhong Sheng to Lu Xun, and after Lu Xun had the character "Lu" engraved on it, it became an heirloom of the Bailie lord's family.

This historical displacement often made He Lingchuan confuse the passage of time.

The two walked toward the post station, and He Lingchuan asked him, "How has Mr. Lu been these past few days?"

"Very well. The order in the city was almost unaffected by the Emperor's Flow, which is truly rare." The day after the first wave of the Emperor's Flow descended, Yuheng City remained orderly; only five houses were burned down, over thirty people were arrested for fighting, and the number of deaths was in the single digits.

Such losses were already negligible, indicating that in the mere year since Panlong City took over Yuheng City, the residents here had already become law-abiding; it also showed that He Lingchuan's coordination was appropriate and the Yuheng Army's control was reasonable, otherwise the Emperor's Flow would have stimulated desires and amplified malice.

He Lingchuan hesitated for a moment before asking, "I have something to ask of Mr. Lu."

"Please speak, Commander He."

"I hear the Lu family has been passed down for nearly three thousand years and is a rare ancient family in this day and age," He Lingchuan said. "I would like to ask Mr. Lu, how does the Lu family pass on its legacy, and how have you managed to continue from generation to generation until now?"

Countless noble and prestigious families could not withstand the test of time and were eventually buried deep in history.

Even for a great empire like Beijia, very few of the meritorious families from its founding have survived to this day.

"Is it just because of the inheritance of destiny?"

Lu Xun looked sideways: "You have also heard the legends of the Lu family's destiny?"

"Commander Zhong mentioned it."

"It seems Commander Zhong holds you in high regard." Otherwise, since Zhong Sheng and He Lingchuan were in a superior-subordinate relationship and usually only needed to issue orders, why would he chat about someone else's family affairs for no reason?

He Lingchuan did not hide it: "I was just curious."

"The Lu family ancestor, the Immortal Hongli, once said that the situation is not always as one wishes, and destiny is always subject to reversal. In the end, it still depends on human effort."

"How does it depend on human effort?"

"Immortal Hongli left a bit of heritage for our family, which any descendant of the Lu bloodline can inherit. But whether it can be used well depends on the descendants themselves."

Heritage? He Lingchuan's heart stirred.

Lu Xun, however, would not go into detail. This was a secret of Bailie, and he would not speak of it to outsiders.

So He Lingchuan asked again: "Only the main branch can inherit it, right?"

"No, no." Lu Xun shook his head, "Even for the collateral branches of the Lu family or those with different surnames, it is possible within five generations."

"That lenient?"

"With spiritual energy waning and the world in flux, if we stubbornly clung to the so-called main branch and insisted on strengthening the trunk while weakening the branches, the Lu family wouldn't have lasted long." Lu Xun laughed, "Over all these years, the Child of Destiny has not appeared only in the main branch; would we just ignore them?"

So it was still because of the Child of Destiny. He Lingchuan understood; this was both the Lu family's blessing and its greatest variable.

Lu Xun sighed with emotion: "It was only after I had managed the family for many years that I understood: in the eyes of the former Immortal Hongli, the survival of Bailie was what mattered most. Who held the head of the Lu family—what did that matter?"

"I see." He Lingchuan asked again, "What if the descendants are incompetent but refuse to yield to the capable? What if both the main and collateral branches are mediocre but still fight endlessly?"

That was likely the norm.

"That is unavoidable. Even with a sliver of Immortal Hongli's destiny protecting us, it has been hard for the Lu family to regain its former glory after all these years, simply because the descendants are unworthy and the clansmen slaughter one another."

Most family successions follow the primogeniture system to avoid internal friction; however, because the Child of Destiny appears randomly, the Lu family has to allow the main and collateral branches to swap, which adds many variables, and fighting among clansmen has become the norm.

Did Immortal Hongli's kindness back then truly bring blessings to his descendants?

"This is the principle of 'breaking to build'—let the capable rise and the mediocre fall." Lu Xun said softly, "If the main branch is mediocre, it cannot last long; if the Lu family is mediocre, it cannot last long. The same is true for all families and nations under heaven."

Looking at history, the Lu family gradually declined, and even with a Child of Destiny appearing every few generations, it was hard to reverse the trend.

This is called the irresistible trend of the times; the destiny of a single clan simply cannot contend with it.

"In this world, the hardest things to gather and the hardest things to rely on are human hearts." Lu Xun shook his head, "And for Bailie, the hardest thing is to have talent in every generation."

When military talent appears, the Lu family experiences a revival; with only mediocre people, the family declines.

He Lingchuan understood that the latter was the norm, which is why Bailie reached that point in reality.

But Lu Xun actually hadn't answered his initial question: why the Lu family could be passed down to this day with its incense burning continuously.

He Lingchuan guessed it might have something to do with Lingshan, and Lu Xun was embarrassed to say it directly.

The two chatted for a while longer, then Hu Min came in from outside and stood silently behind He Lingchuan.

Lu Xun tactfully said: "Commander He, please go about your business; no need to accompany an idle guest like me. I am going to eat."

He Lingchuan did not stand on ceremony with him, exchanged a few laughs, and took his leave.

After returning to the City Guard Station, He Lingchuan walked into the meeting hall, summoned the sand table, and set up a barrier.

Hu Min had returned to report on the military situation in Longchuan.

After the Qianjin Stronghold and the Qiuhua Gang were recruited as managers of the Longchuan trade routes, they served as an excellent leading example. Even with the aggressive pressure from the Xiji puppet army, the bandit gangs within Longchuan surrendered to Yuheng City one after another.

Between not being able to survive and sitting there collecting money, even a fool would know how to choose.

He Lingchuan even allowed the small and medium-sized bandit gangs that surrendered voluntarily to have priority in choosing sections—that is, the sections where they would manage the toll collection.

First come, first served.

There were good and bad sections; poorer places didn't collect much money, and there were costs to managing them.

This greatly stimulated the enthusiasm of the small and medium-sized bandit gangs to surrender; after all, no one wanted to let others have the first taste of the soup while they were left to gnaw on bones.

After the situation of the civilian bandits acting in unison against outsiders was broken, Yuheng City promoted the heads of Longchuan villages and reputable elders to local officials and required them to promote household registration—meaning all villagers in Longchuan had to be entered into the register by name, age, place of origin, status, appearance, financial situation, and other items.

After several decades, Longchuan finally conducted a population census once again.

With this complete set of data, Yuheng City's control over Longchuan increased greatly.

At the same time, Yuheng City also dispatched a large number of personnel to Longchuan, calling it "cooperative management." But since gangs like the Qianjin Stronghold were all eating from the public pot from top to bottom, and the village heads and elders had become local officials, what power or stance did they have to oppose it?

After these people moved in, there were no more secrets within Longchuan; village locations, population distribution, types and numbers of monsters, and even information on crops, farmland, and produce were all sent to He Lingchuan for his decision-making reference.

Of course, the most important thing was intelligence on the enemy.

For the first time, He Lingchuan figured out the true number of the Xiji puppet army: two thousand seven hundred people.

This included the Beijia squad brought by Fushan Lie, the three remnants of the Xiji forces defeated by General Hong and Commander Xiao, the other Longchuan water bandits they had annexed, and even a portion of the Jintao army!

(End of chapter)